Welcome back to Books With Cause. Let’s dive into my latest review. Die, My Love is a brutal, surreal exploration of postpartum depression and the suffocation of domestic life. I picked this one up thanks to the recent film adaptation starring Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson, and it turned out to be one of the most memorable curiosities on my reading list this year.
This is probably quite a surprising book on my list this year. And it’s the sort of book I probably wouldn’t have heard of if it weren’t for the recent film adaptation. This book was initially published in Spanish by an Argentine author, but it is set in rural France. I am only aware of it because of the movie adaptation, which is set in Montana and stars Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson as the leads.
In the book, the characters are never named. The majority of the book is from the perspective of a woman struggling with postpartum depression. She only ever refers to the other characters in this book as “my husband” and “my son”. While she says that they deliberately never named their son because they didn’t want there to be any record of him, one would presume that the husband and wife were given names by their respective parents. I think the lack of a name for the protagonist is deliberate on the author’s part because I think she’d have wanted other women to read this book and relate to it. Maybe that’s easier if the protagonist isn’t named.
On the second page, it is suggested that the woman didn’t actually want children, and her husband essentially impregnated her against her consent. Now he’s away from home working most of the time, leaving her alone to look after a brat who rarely seems to stop screaming long enough for her to think. She doesn’t feel as attached to her son as she thinks she should. As well as spending a lot of time at work, the husband isn’t fulfilling the wife’s needs. She suspects him of cheating, and she masturbates a lot to fill the void in her life.
This is quite a strange book to read. On one hand, the chapters are quite short, but on the other, there is little in the way of formatting. Every chapter is one paragraph, which can be a solid wall of text. There is no punctuation to suggest dialogue or label speakers. Likewise, this might suggest that this book is intended as the protagonist’s diary, and maybe that’s why the format doesn’t match that of a traditional book.
That said, this is quite a short book at just over 120 pages, and a lot happens in such a short space of time. If you’re looking for a quick read where lots happens, this just might be the book for you.
My Goodreads rating: ★★★☆☆ (3 stars)
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